Classified Ad Decision

[McRabbet]

As you all recall, I put out a Staff Announcement entitled Classified Ad Policy Clarification four days ago and it has stirred up some comments from a few commercial members. Our answers have tried to remind them of our long-standing but unwritten policy of allowing Wood Sellers to post special events in the Wood Forum.

Here is part of one of my responses (to Patti LaBelle of Nice Figures) in that thread.

By the way, you (and our other commercial members) may post a special wood offering in the Wood forum if it pertains to North Carolina Woodworker members only. If I recall correctly, you did this several times when you were based in Chapel Hill and that policy has not changed. We are trying to be fair to all commercial members, yet we want our regular members to benefit from special offerings (it might be as a discounted price or perhaps a donation to NC Woodworker). In order to maintain this as a free, non-profit website, we need advertising revenue as well.

I passed on a similar comment to Kalai in Hawaii concerning his desire to sell some special turning blanks -- read his thread posted tonight, which I think meets our criteria.

Here is a second Draft Classified Ads Policy for your review:

Classified Ads Policy
​

Members of the website may place advertisements in the Classified Section of the website. Ads must be placed in an appropriate category and are limited to woodworking-related items or services that are For Sale, or Wanted or are offered Free to fellow members. Ads may not contain links to off-site auction sites or public sales websites, but may include links to personal or reference websites related to the item in the Ad (e.g., manufacturer). Pictures are encouraged within the Ad and links to a member photo gallery on www.ncwoodworker.net or elsewhere are permitted.

Ad content must relate to woodworking, tools, wood and wood products, accessories for woodworking equipment or workshop items. Members may use the Classified Section for one-time sale of woodworking items they make, but may not market production items for profit. Ads for items may be renewed (bumped) twice; if an item does not sell, the originator should consider reducing price before renewing the Ad. Commercial Ads or Services for Hire are not allowed in Classifieds, but certain "Special Sales" may be placed as outlined in the next paragraph. Members wanting to place commercial Ads should use the Contact Us link for options available. Any Ads that do not meet these criteria may only be posted with the express permission of a Staff member (who shall be named in the Ad), or the Ad will be moderated or deleted. Classified Ads are for members only; guests may browse Ads, but do not see any Member contact information.​

Commercial Members selling lumber, turning woods or other unfinished raw wood products may post a thread in the "Wood" Forum as long as the following criteria are met: (1) The offering is exclusively for NC Woodworker Members; (2) Pricing should be lower than normal sales at their regular place of business; and (3) A discount to members and/or a nominal donation to NC Woodworker, Inc. per $100 in total sales is included in the offering. All added costs such as Sales Tax and Shipping and Handling should be clearly spelled out. "Special Sales" shall be limited to once per Commercial Member per month. No finished products may be offered.

 

[Travis Porter]

No arguments with what you have written, but should there be a statement about postings like Asheville Hardware does? They are offering sales and stuff, and I like seeing them (wish I could go) and posting in threads, not classifieds, and I think that is ok according to policy, right?

 

[McRabbet]

As I see it, they limit their posts to classes, sales and demos, but never specific products, per se. I think they are fine -- Willard Anderson posts classes and I do not see problems there either -- since this is actually for Classified Ads, it is hard to cover everything -- maybe all of this new stuff should go in the Site Policy...

 

[Travis Porter]

Agreed. Works for me.

 

[TracyP]

:thumbs_up:thumbs_up:thumbs_up Good sounding edit.

 

[scsmith42]

Looks good to me too.

One thing that would be nice is to do a feature writeup once every month or two on one of commercial advertisers. That way over the course of a year everybody would get some type of "special mention", and it would probably help secure additional loyalty.